Dusk settled over the land. The fragrance of cooking drifted through the streets and alleys, mingling with the scattered sounds of children playing in the distance and nearby, filling the evening with the warmth of ordinary life.
In the dim alley, the faint tapping of a white cane against the ground echoed softly.
Pei Xiu pressed his lips together and walked extremely slowly.
He had only begun using the white cane after arriving in Beiliang County, and he was not yet accustomed to it.
In the past, he had lived deep within a small courtyard. He knew every inch of it, and could manage well enough.
But once he stepped outside the courtyard gate, the world became an expanse of the unknown.
For a blind man who could see nothing, the unknown was the most frightening thing of all.
Pei Xiu’s not-yet-fully-grown figure was tall and slender. Seen from behind, he looked entirely like a young gentleman strolling leisurely through the world.
Yet the veins bulging across the back of his hand, the fine sweat at the tip of his nose, and his tightly pursed lips all revealed the growing unease in his heart.
“Su Ying…”
Whenever he could no longer hear her familiar footsteps, he would softly call her name.
Su Ying was not actually far away. After walking a few steps, she would stop and wait for him.
But Pei Xiu could not see her.
All he could do was call her name again and again, hoping for a response that would dispel the unease threatening to swallow him whole.
Su Ying had always been cold and sparing with her words. Nine times out of ten, she would not answer him.
The only response he ever received was when his calls annoyed her so much that she told him to shut up.
Pei Xiu would fall silent for a while, then quietly call her again.
The deep alley that Su Ying could normally cross in the time it took to blink had taken them a quarter of an hour, and they had only made it halfway.
Su Ying sighed. She removed the hair ribbon tying up her hair and casually snapped off a branch poking over the courtyard wall, using it to pin her hair in place.
She tied one end of the ribbon around her own wrist and the other around Pei Xiu’s.
Pei Xiu looked blankly in her direction. “Su Ying, what are you doing?”
Su Ying did not answer. She merely moved her wrist lightly.
Only when the faint vibration traveled along the hair ribbon to Pei Xiu’s wrist did he understand.
For some reason, his face grew slightly hot.
“Let’s go.” Su Ying glanced at the sky and murmured, “I wonder if we’ll still be able to get anything to eat by the time we make it out.”
If she had known, she would not have wasted that pot of plain porridge.
Pei Xiu’s expression turned faintly bashful, and he hurriedly moved forward.
Perhaps the tug and vibration transmitted through the hair ribbon steadied his heart. He covered the remaining half of the distance in the time it took to drink a cup of tea.
In a good mood, Su Ying took the initiative to ask him, “Do you remember the way?”
Pei Xiu nodded. “After one hundred seventy-three steps, there is a wall; turn left. After ninety-two steps, there is a fork; take the left path. After two hundred forty-one steps, there is another wall; turn right. Then comes a straight road.”
The white cane in his hand touched the corner of the wall at the mouth of the alley. “To here, it is four hundred five steps.”
“…”
Su Ying’s usually impassive expression cracked. “Isn’t remembering it that rigid a little excessive? Can you guarantee that every step you take is exactly the same length?”
“Yes,” Pei Xiu replied. “Each of my steps is one chi and five cun.”
Su Ying: “…”
What a rigid young master from an aristocratic family.
Beyond the alley was a side street, its two sides crowded with stalls selling all kinds of goods.
It was nearly the exact hour of Xu, and only half an hour remained before curfew. Most of the vendors were busy packing up.
Su Ying led him to the right. “This is where they sell flour-based foods. There are steamed buns, stuffed buns, and noodles.”
After walking a few more steps, she continued, “They sell cooked food and braised meat here. The braised meat you usually eat comes from this place.”
She proceeded slowly, introducing the grocery shop, the grain and oil shop, the pharmacy, and several small stores that appeared clean.
Pei Xiu kept his eyes lowered and listened quietly.
With curfew approaching, the two of them did not eat outside. They bought several steamed buns and half a roast chicken, then returned home.
They ate their dinner without tasting a thing. Pei Xiu still did not say a word, and went to wash up and lie down early.
With no one tirelessly calling her name, Su Ying felt a rare sense of peace and did not notice anything amiss.
Before going to sleep, she brought over the medicated oil. “Get up and let me apply the medicine.”
The person lying on his side did not move.
Su Ying leaned over to look at him. “Are you asleep?”
His trembling lashes gave him away. Su Ying was exasperated. “Don’t tell me you’re pretending to be asleep because you’re afraid it will hurt.”
Pei Xiu buried his head deeper beneath the quilt and said nothing.
Seeing that he was resisting, Su Ying did not force him. She set the medicated oil on the table, then climbed into bed.
She had only woken at nightfall and was not sleepy yet.
After tossing and turning for a while, she got up again, intending to sort through the medicinal herbs drying in the corner of the courtyard so she could take them to a familiar pharmacy to sell the next day.
She had just put on her shoes when the person on the other side of the curtain hurriedly rolled over and sat up.
“Su Ying! Where—where are you going?”
“Weren’t you asleep? What business is it of yours where I go?”
After tossing out those words, Su Ying left the room.
It was the fifteenth day of the lunar month, and a full moon hung in the sky, spilling its clear radiance over the entire courtyard.
After bolting the courtyard gate, Su Ying leisurely sorted the medicinal herbs beneath the moonlight.
Before long, the sound of a white cane tapping against the ground emerged from the room.
The sound stopped at the doorway, then there was no movement for a long while.
Su Ying turned to look.
The tall, slender young man stood with one hand on the doorframe, half his face concealed in the dimness. He did not move at all.
Moonlight fell across his thin shoulders, inexplicably lending him an air of desolation.
Su Ying’s gaze fell to the misaligned toggles on the front of his clothing, and she sensed that something was wrong.
Pei Xiu had always been meticulous about his clothing and hair. Aside from the ordinary materials and the lack of luxurious embroidery, there was no difference from before.
Thinking back carefully, this was the first time Su Ying had ever seen him fasten his toggles incorrectly.
Her expression grew solemn.
Could it be… that Pei Xiu had a sleepwalking disorder?
It was said that people suffering from a sleepwalking disorder often rose at night and wandered about. When they awoke at dawn, they would have no memory at all of what they had done the night before.
There was even an old tale circulating among the common folk about a man surnamed Zhang. One night, while sleepwalking, he mistook the head of a fellow villager sharing his room for a watermelon and hacked at it with a knife.
He had remained in a daze, sleeping through the night in a pool of blood. When he opened his eyes the next day and saw the scarlet mess covering the bed, he was so frightened that his soul nearly left his body. In the end, it was the neighbors who came after hearing the commotion and reported him to the authorities.
Only after an old coroner carefully examined the scene did the truth become clear. From then on, people learned that such a strange hidden illness as a sleepwalking disorder actually existed.
Su Ying had also heard that a sleepwalker must never be awakened.
At best, they might be frightened into becoming an imbecile. At worst, their heart and gallbladder might rupture, and they could be scared to death.
She held her breath even more carefully, watching his every movement with trepidation, afraid that she might disturb him by accident.
No one knew how much time passed before Pei Xiu, standing as still as a stone carving, slowly lowered his head.
Su Ying stared at him. Then, all at once, as if she had received an enormous shock, her pupils contracted sharply.
A tear slid swiftly from the corner of Pei Xiu’s eye. It hung from his handsome, defined chin, suspended between falling and remaining in place.
Under the moonlight, it glimmered faintly.
“Pei Xiu…” Su Ying said dazedly.
Could sleepwalkers cry, too?
Hearing that nearly inaudible murmur, Pei Xiu’s entire body went rigid. He abruptly turned toward the sound.
The corners of his eyes were red. His lips moved soundlessly, and his body seemed to tremble faintly.
The sight frightened Su Ying badly. She thought she had nearly scared her benefactor to death.
She hurriedly rose and walked over, reaching out to press the philtrum beneath his nose.
The instant she touched him, a cold hand seized hers.
The heat radiating from her palm caused Pei Xiu’s withered heart to begin beating again, like spring water breaking through ice. It pounded so hard that his chest ached.
“Su Ying…” he said hoarsely. “You didn’t leave?”